India home to a quarter of world's hungry

HUNGER PANGS: The per capita availability of food grains has declined from 510 grams in 1991 to 422 grams in 2005.

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Keywords: Food Grain, Population

New Delhi: While the nation debates the budget and our impressive economic growth, there's a large section of the country fighting a never ending battle against hunger. India is home to a quarter of the worlds hungry and the numbers are only increasing.

Ironically, people who grow the food we eat are fighting hunger. If the faces of the poor and the figures on the official documents are anything to go by, India is losing its most important battle, the battle against hunger

The UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation's report reveals that India has added more newly hungry millions in the years that followed economic reforms as compared to the rest of the world put together.

Out of the 18 million of newly hungry people in the world, approximately 13 million came from India. The government's own records show that the rural family is consuming 100 kgs food grains less in a year than it did a decade ago.

Food grains absorption in rural India has fallen to a historic low, lower than before the Second World War as reported in NSS surveys of the UNWFP. The per capita availability of food grains has declined from 510 grams in 1991 to 422 grams in 2005.

About 8 million hectares of land has been diverted away from food grains production. For the first time in decades the rate of food grain production is lagging the rate of population growth. However, for a country that is growing at almost 10 per cent, these are ominous signs.